Inslee Officially Extends Stay At Home, Starts “Phase 1″ of Recovery

Calling it his "Safe Start" plan, Gov. Inslee Monday signed on for another 27 days of Stay at Home.

According to a statement released Monday, May 4, Phase One of this plan supposedly began today. Not a lot of people outside of the media and government paid a ton of attention, as most were occupied by the 27 added days of lock down.

According to Inslee's office (verbatim):

"Safe Start sets a careful approach to emerging from the pandemic. It allows for modifications of business closures and physical distancing measures while minimizing the health impacts of COVID-19."

From the Governor's release:

"This phased approach to re-opening our economy will allow us to move forward with a careful and thoughtful balance of our state’s health and economic needs,” Inslee said. “However, if infection rates and hospitalizations for COVID-related issues go up, I would not hesitate to scale these efforts back down to protect public health and save lives.

“I fully recognize the impact this is having on families, workers and businesses, but we have not yet won the fight against this virus,” Inslee continued. “We continue to see infection rates, hospitalizations and deaths across the state from COVID-19.”

While Stay Home, Stay Healthy is being extended to the end of May, the governor announced his Safe Start plan which amends some components of the original order and allow for a start to re-open the state. "

However, growing numbers of critics, including business leaders and legislators, say the lack of timetables, direction and continued vague ambiguity from Inslee are going to hurt small and even medium business recovery; could push many into bankruptcy. State Representative Jacquelin Maycumber (R-Republic WA) says continued extensions without a sound economic plan will just make it harder for them to rebound.